Our Wichita Marketing Top Ten List Gets Personal: What we learned in 2012.

Posted on December 31, 2012 by Dave Mace

This is the fourth year we’ve done a list of the top “things” in the previous year. We’ve done ad campaigns, business blunders, etc. But this year, we want to get more personal.

So, rather than rap about a bunch of stuff to which we’re not intimately connected, we want to get a little more personal and share, in no certain order, what we’ve learned in 2012 that makes us better humans, business owners and marketers.

“Be wise as serpents and gentle as doves.” I say we learned this in 2012, not because we hadn’t read the scripture many times but because we finally learned our lesson through living it. You have to trust people, but there are degrees of trust and amounts of reputation and money you might be willing to risk.

“Plan for the worst. Hope for the best.” It is impossible to plan for every outcome, but you have to look at a number of scenarios or possible outcomes, prepare for them and then pursue your goals.

“Know when to stand there and when to do something.” Again, this is an imperfect science, a messy blend of guts and brains which, we hope, will end in glory. Will Rogers’ familiar refrain went through my head many times this year: “You may be on the right track, but if you just sit there, you’ll get run over.” The trick to business is doing the right mix of things concurrently. It’s rare that we get to work on one thing at a time, check it off the list and move on to the next thing.

“Your list is only as good as your ability to cross things off before you start.” We learned this from Ron Carson and the PEAK process. Force yourself to put no more than Six things on your list for the day. We found ourselves scrounging for the sixth most important thing most days. It is a good exercise to help stay focused and productive.

Basically, it’s about focus and effort. Focus on the right thing (singular) and moving in the right direction (just one), with a multi-faceted strategy. Odds are, it will take more than one approach and source of effort to move the entire organization in a single direction. Not the other way around. In other words, you’re better off having multiple people and processes pulling and pushing in the same direction, toward the same goal than having one or many people and processes going every which way.

If fear of going in the wrong direction (which is common), is preventing you from doing anything at all, don’t be afraid to try something. Have a method in place to measure your success (or lack of) and pull the plug if it’s not working. Then you can try something else. Learn from your mistakes, but don’t beat yourself up.

There. Feel better? I do. Thanks for letting me share.

Happy New Year, Wichita Small Business!

Apple getting its marketing groove back?

Posted on December 29, 2012 by Dave Mace

We love the fact that Apple has no disclaimer on its new ad showing color iPods jumping all over the place. We hope this is the sign that Apple is getting its attitude back. Check out this latest ad. What does it say about the Apple brand?

Getting Back To Nature Makes For Better Client Relationships

Posted on November 11, 2012 by Dave Mace

We’ve all heard about how small things can make a big difference. If you have ever taken a kid or client hunting or fishing, then you know how rewarding little things can be.

Here in Kansas, we are blessed with some incredible populations of whitetail deer, pheasant and turkey that draw serious hunters from all over the nation. I know a few really wealthy hunters who have moved to Kansas JUST to be close to trophy whitetail. And we all have clients who want to recapture a bit of their youth or just unplug for a weekend.

On our way to turkey hunt this weekend, we bumped into several guys who made the drive to Kansas for the pheasant opener. I routinely see people from Alabama, Georgia, Texas and Missouri here for the same reason. Right under our noses is a treasure trove of potential amazing relationship-building experiences with our clients.

It took me exactly 29 hours, a little bit of guide work and a couple phone calls to help a friend and client and his son get their Kansas turkeys this weekend. It solidified a strong relationship and led to the kinds of conversations you just can’t have in the office.

Experiencing the outdoors (and other types of recreational activities) with clients creates memories, builds relationships and helps uncover referrals and common friendships.

If you have a lot of discretionary marketing income, spending money on things like hunting, fishing, or golf trips is easy. If not, hunting and fishing trips still offer fantastic opportunities for the cost of gas and some ammo.

You probably have friends and clients who can help you with getting outfitted. If not, give us a call. We’re very well connected to rural and sporting areas. Even if it’s not really your “thing,” but you would like to check it out as an addition to your prospecting and relationship repertoire, just let us know.

WARNING: Explicit lyrics! There are seven dirty words in marketing too!

Posted on October 29, 2012 by Dave Mace

You might have seen the video or remember the stand-up comedy routine by George Carlin about the seven words you can’t say on TV. In case you’ve forgotten, you can view it below. But did you know there are also seven dirty words in marketing?

In the interest of brevity, let’s just say that each of these words is dirty, i.e. should never be used in marketing and promotional materials because it lacks originality, is irrelevant or offends the sensibilities of the intelligent and b.s.-wary consumer.

So, here they are. Say them fast like George and write them down. And whatever you do…don’t use them in a sentence when you talk about your products and services.

1. Value: I decide, not you. So don’t talk about it like that.

2. Quality: Should be a given. Also, quality registers on many levels, so what does that even mean?

3. Best: And you know this, how?

4. Amazing: Seriously? What are you, a magician or a trapeze artist?

5. Integrity: If you have to tell me you’re honest…

6. Service: Well, that is why I’m paying you, isn’t it.

7. Established: I don’t care if you’re a bank or a hot dog stand: Length of service don’t guarantee satisfaction.

Great service on-premises is still the best marketing

Posted on October 7, 2012 by Dave Mace

A perfect day with my son was capped off by a near-perfect meal at Joe’s Crab Shack in Olathe, KS, thanks to a perfect customer service save by the staff and management. After all, the best food marketing is great service and great food.

The weather was a perfect fall day, and despite a less-than-perfect performance by KC QB Matt Cassel, my son and I had a great day at Arrowhead thanks to club level tickets from my buddy Joe.

We paced ourselves foodwise and stopped at Joe’s for some Dungeness crabs. We got there at 4:46 pm, and by 5:05, we still didn’t have drinks. I waved at the manager, and he sent a server our way. The server apologized for the mistake and got our food and drinks out to us right away.

We were pleasantly surprised when it was time for the bill and our $22.99 steampot was comp’d.

For someone who coaches restaurant owners, managers and business owners, it was truly gratifying to get a no-questions-asked make-good in our dining experience. Plus, we got a coupon for a free appetizer.

Great marketing, Joe’s Crab Shack. Jackson and I will be coming back.

Avoid the baseball-driven temptation to use contrived stats to boost your marketing

Posted on August 25, 2012 by Dave Mace

You know what amazes me about sports? It’s the ability to constantly come up with new ways to re-invent the game and make it fun, different, more appealing, more profitable. Baseball was dead. So was NBA. Last time I checked, Seattle would give up Starbucks to get the Supersonics back, and David Glass (the owner of the KC Royals) is still cashing fat checks from New York Yankees TV royalties .

The latest craze is what you might call, the “pseudo-stat.” Some of these contrived statistics are more ridiculous than others, but here’s an example: WOR. Excuse me? Oh, yes. “Wins Over Replacement.” It’s a new one that basically measures one player’s impact over and above the impact of the next best player at that position. The newest one on me today was “ground ball/fly ball” ratio.

What’s next? Walks Given on $1 Hot Dog Night? I can’t even come up with an acronym for that one. Fireworks Friday Third-Base-Side Foul Outs? Come on!

But baseball isn’t the only business with silly statistics meant to capture your interest. Have you been sucked in by any of those cash back offers on cars lately? How about this one: “Midwest Leader in Roofing.” Even if I could properly define “Midwest,” what makes you the leader? Wait, I know. You have the best service, prices and highest-quality materials.

I guess the point is that any organization or individual can make a claim. Or, if you dig deep enough, you can always find something that seems redeeming about doing business with someone. Maybe they HAVE sold the most cars. McDonald’s has sold the most burgers. Does that make them the best? You know the answer.

True, you might do something fairly unique that makes you more competitive. But that’s different than digging for something obscure that may or may not be correlated to success. Because all that matters at the end of the day is if the dogs eat the dog food.

Fun stats. Great bar talk. Just don’t make investment decisions based on them. And don’t expect your customers to, either.

Why is Facebook stock so important to your Wichita small business?

Posted on August 20, 2012 by Dave Mace

You have probably been watching Facebook’s ill-fated IPO and subsequent plunge in stock price. But did you see any lessons for your small business from the whole thing?

For one, it’s a great lesson about the company you keep and the vendors you choose. One would think NASDAQ a fine partner for a public offering. But they really screwed it up. The bad thing for Facebook, though, is it didn’t distance itself far enough or fast enough from the exchange’s missteps.

In fact, the PR machine one would expect from a behemoth like Facebook was noticeably absent. I couldn’t believe no one was out front spinning this thing.

So, the first key lesson is to admit fault and assume control right away. It might help slow down or avoid a 20-point tailspin.

Next, there have been no rumors or reports of the next innovation from Facebook. Again, the PR flacks have been completely AWOL. You probably need almost daily injections of news and positive speculation to even begin to counter your oldest and largest investors unloading nearly half their stock holdings.

Granted, you might not be looking to do an IPO at any time in your company’s future, but you still have a reputation to uphold. At the very least, you have customers who will develop at least part of their image of you based on what they see and hear in the marketplace. No news is never good news. Why? Because if you don’t fill the vacuum with your message, someone else will twist it to suit their own needs.

The best thing is having a customer stick up for you when somebody else is talking smack. The worst thing is overhearing someone telling your customer a bunch of garbage that they can’t refute. You can’t create evangelists if you’re not out there spreading your message.

Heard at Governors Convention: Marketing and Leadership as Vital as Technology

Posted on July 15, 2012 by Dave Mace

Thanks to C-SPAN, I got to see a couple of tremendous business thinkers address the National Governors Association.

First up was Steve Blank, an entrepreneur and professor. The two points I took from him were:

1. We can’t plug big, corporate thinking into small businesses and expect it to work.

2. Marketing is probably the most neglected part of start-up businesses. Blank advocates the same kind of approach we use here at Valé. Start by discovering customers and then adapt your business model to them. Make sure the business model is scalable. Then find more customers.

The clients who are most difficult to help are the ones who are some convinced they are right and spend money on facilities and employees before confirming the market feasibility of their idea by defining their customer target.

I was also blessed to hear Jim Collins, author of Good to Great speak about the qualities of great leaders of great companies.

Collins reminds us that good and great leaders share many qualities. But the great ones separate themselves from the pack because of their humility and their discipline.

Let me explain how this relates to marketing and management. First, humility allows you to admit when you are wrong or accept others’ ideas. This relates to entrepreneurship and marketing because it’s important to “fail fast” and get moving in the right direction.

In explaining why discipline is important, Collins used illustrations from history. Suffice it to say that it is better to have a system and work it with discipline, making incremental changes. This is superior to reacting wildly every time something changes.

Collins also spoke of the paradox of leadership. You must be determined and persevere, but you must also be willing to adapt. You must continually have faith that you will succeed, but you must not be blindly optimistic.

The best leaders, CEOs, business owners or marketing professionals must be willing to face hard, brutal facts. In Collins’ research, it was the CEOs who faced the music and made difficult decisions expediently who built great companies.

Reality. It’s not always fun, but it is really. The quicker we accept the realities of customer desires and how we should market to them, the more likely we are to succeed.

If word of mouth is your best marketing tool then your customer service better rock

Posted on July 13, 2012 by Dave Mace

I constantly hear from clients that word of mouth is their best marketing tool. And with social media creating a giant megaphone for the masses, making certain that word is good is more important than ever.

A friend of mine had a remarkable experience at a well-known restaurant in San Antonio the other day.

He was at County Line BBQ when, having enjoyed a delicious meal, he was quite literally doused with BBQ sauce when the server flipped his plate into my friend’s lap. It was all over his shirt and shorts, requiring immediate and thorough attention to prevent ruining the clothes.

The server offered soda water. “Well, I guess this means dinner’s free,” my friend joked. “Oh, no,” the waiter replied. “It would come out of my check.”

“Sort of like my clothes will come out of my check,” my buddy muttered.

So then the manager stops by the table and says, “I hear we had a little accident.” “Yep,” said my friend, expecting recompense.

“Well, other than that, was the food OK?” “Yes, I’m wearing it,” my buddy thought. “Let me get you some more soda water.”

No comp dessert. No BOGO. No coupon. Nothing.

Then when the server brings them the check my friend and his wife find out they were charged extra for ice cream they didn’t order on their peach cobbler.

I don’t think I need to say much more. Needless to say my friend has told this story many time in the past week. And now it’s in the Web. Soon it will go viral and people will hear what seems at first an isolated story. But if something like this happens very often, then things will go bad for County Line.

Don’t be like County Line behaved in this instance.